


coda cadenza

by apotheosizing



Category: Fate/Zero, Fate/stay night & Related Fandoms
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Bad Ending, Characters Making Worse Decisions Than in Canon, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-25
Updated: 2020-08-25
Packaged: 2021-03-06 22:08:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 914
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26096122
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/apotheosizing/pseuds/apotheosizing
Summary: Saber reaches the grail.
Relationships: Irisviel von Einzbern/Arturia Pendragon | Saber
Comments: 1
Kudos: 26
Collections: femslashficlets





	coda cadenza

**Author's Note:**

> This is a bit handwave-y about command seals vs independent action skills but I always wondered what it would be like for Saber to touch the grail during the F/Z timeline.
> 
> Also, though Kiritsugu gets a bad rap here due to this being from Saber's POV, I promise I don't hate him! He's a great character, it's just that Saber thinks the worst of him.

As the world fell apart, her gauntleted hand strained to touch the rim of the golden chalice, dropping Excalibur like the metal of its hilt scalded. His eyes wide with the realization of her intentions, Kiritsugu spent his final command seal. It burned in a paroxysm of red, lashing and seeking to hold her back, drown her like a lone swimmer struggling against the tide, but it did not ensnare her quickly enough.

The shining blade of the sword of promised victory clattered against the concrete of the amphitheatre in the same breath that Saber's fingers found the grail. Rather than hear the clink of steel against gold, Saber felt a gentle hand land on hers with the shock of fallen snow melting on exposed skin and then her vision went dark.

Vertigo gripped her as she fell, sightless, through darker depths than she had ever known. Before her mind could catch up to her body, just as unexpectedly as it had begun, the sensation ceased. She stared out at the rolling green hills of Camlann, uncomprehending. Its beauty, unspoiled by the conflict she would visit upon it, was striking but did not drive the confusion from her mind. Saber - or perhaps just Arthur, now - glanced down at herself to see not the blue and silver of her battle dress but the dusty brown of her childhood garb.

Brow furrowed, she struggled to think through the whirlwind of her reeling mind until all thought ceased, but one. The light pressure of uncomplicated contact, so foreign to her, hung across her shoulders. Locks of white hair cascaded down them as Irisviel's familiar form manifested at her back, embracing her with none of the tenderness and all of the possessiveness she had never had in life. "Hello, my knight. I've been waiting for you."

Saber twisted in her hold, laying eyes once more on the smile that broke her heart. "You... are not Irisviel," Saber said, knowing what Kiritsugu had tried to keep from her since her arrival, _what_ rather than _whom_ in his eyes she had been protecting. "Who are you?"

Irisviel's radiant expression did not falter. "I am here to grant your wish," she proclaimed, neatly sidestepping Saber's question. Irisviel tilted her head upward, drawing her companion's attention there. A void hung in the sky, ringed red like an eclipse, and emptiness fell in imitation of rain from its contours down to the fields below. Thousands of stars, more than she had seen on even the clearest nights, dotted the heavens like puncture wounds. It was a terrible and beautiful sight in equal measure.

"You need only speak, give it form, and that which you have suffered so long to bring to fruition will be accomplished." Saber watched the rain fall, glimpsing the carnage she remembered from the last time she stood atop these hills in its depths.

She wanted to refuse, to call upon the oath she'd made to Irisviel that she would ensure the wish she and her husband shared was granted, to allow dawn to break on a world saved. Drawing upon all her virtue, she composed the words of her surrender. With that same casual intimacy, Irisviel placed a finger over her lips and the words died in her throat. "What is your wish, Saber?"

The part of her that had always been the stubborn girl who had walked on the thorny path of the king remained resolute, no matter how painfully the barbs dug into her heels. "My lord's wishes are my own," she insisted.

Irisviel released Saber from her encircling arms to laugh, a light, tinkling sound like a chime battered by the wind. "Then, as your lord, let me tell you what I want. I want you to tell me _your_ wish, not someone else's."

The pain of mourning broke anew unto her heart. She knew the woman before her was merely a manifestation of the will of the grail but she was caught by the memory of their first conversation, where she had once before been granted such permission. Saber only ever spoke as a knight, a king, a saint, never as herself, the human beneath it all. Irisviel, when she lived, had recognized that, too, and teased the words of the person Arthur from her with warm tea and kind words.

Before she could think better of it, the wish fell from her lips with frightening ease. "I wish that I had never drawn Caliburn from the stone. I wish that I had never become king and set my kingdom on the path to ruin."

A dark look of triumph crossed Irisviel's eyes - no, the grail's, Irisviel would never look at her so. "Thy will be done," she said, soft and sickly sweet. The grail pressed a feather-light kiss to her forehead, Irisviel's nature shining through its glassy black depths.

In the span of an instant, the vision of Irisviel and the moonful sky filled with stars disappeared. Fire and metal twisted as her fatal battle erupted from beneath her feet. The black tar of the grail pooled heavily around her legs like quicksand Saber could not hope to escape. As she sank into the all-consuming ash, her eyes fixed on the bloody culmination of her desire and failure to protect her people, she prayed her wish would be granted.

In the last moment of her existence, she knew with awful clarity that it would be, fashioned by crueler hands than hers had ever been.


End file.
